Class: Frigate
Role: Boarding Vessel
Speed: 230
Attack: 80
Hit Points: 18,000
Cost: 700 RU
Armament:
1 x Heavy Vulcan Kinetic Turret (twin)

Special Version: Captain Soban's Ship
Speed: 230
Attack: 500
Hit Points: 50,000

Originally a modified cargo transport, the Marine Frigate has evolved into a fast, highly armored delivery vehicle used to insert Hiigaran Marines into hostile ships. The Marines are highly trained in raiding, disabling, and gaining control of enemy vessels. Given enough time they’ve been known to gain control of Mothership class assets, giving their enemies a very nasty surprise.

"Cool ships? This is one of my favorite ones: the Marine Frigate. Since salvaging was such a big part of Homeworld, and they didn’t really intend it to be a big part of Homeworld, we actually made capturing ships one of the key gameplay elements. So each race has a capture frigate. It essentially flies up to an enemy ship and docks." - Josh Mosquiera, Lead Designer

"The Marine Frigate is a Hiigaran unit designed for disabling and capturing enemy ships. Pulling up alongside enemy capships, it latches to the hull, cuts through the outer plating, and inserts elite Hiigaran Marines who make short work of command systems and ship personnel. Given enough time, they'll take the ship over and it will come under your control." - Sierra HW2 Official Site

"Some bigger changes have been made to existing units as well like the salvage ships which have also been replaced by Marine Frigates for boarding exercises." - Dan Adams, IGN PC

"And while you may be very confident about sending your capital ship into battle before against such a force, now you understand that, well, that’s all well and good, but if they cripple my propulsion, and the Marine Frigates come in, and they can capture my ship from me." - Alex Rodberg, Brand Manager (Sierra)

"One cool feature is the takeover of an enemy ship by marines, who actually dock the ship you've targeted. The subsystems of enemy ships can be targeted and this will obviously be the primary way of weakening a ship without completely destroying it. Once the enemy ship has been weakened enough, all you need to do is dock your marine frigate onto the ship and watch the leathernecks do their thing." - James Diaz, LoadedInc

It has finally been confirmed that this is indeed the Marine Frigate. It is armed with a single topside turret. It boards enemy vessels by positioning itself nearby and "beaming" marines aboard. If the frigate can stay on station for long enough, it can capture any vessel, no matter how large, and regardless of whether or not it is disabled or damaged.

In single-player mission #2, a Sobani fleet led by a Marine Frigate (under the command of a "Captain Soban") arrives to aid the player in driving off the Vaygr attack. Soban's ship is much more powerful than an ordinary Marine Frigate.

Incidentally, Captain Soban is the foremost figure depicted in the original HW2 Poster.